Value Added Traveling

There are many good reasons that I should go to Russia, first and foremost is that I want to. There are also many reasons I shouldn't go, namely that I have no money. Regardless, I am going since I've already bought the ticket. But this isn't what I want to write about.

What I want to write about is why this trip is a good one to go on. When I traveled to London, I had never been there before nor did I know anything about the layout. All I knew is that it's the capital of London and there are many iconic buildings and important places there. Many important events occurred in London. Plus, I heard it was a fun town. I spent the first two nights there on my own, which was fun but I had no idea what I was doing. Most of the time, I'd just buy a ticket and ride the double deckers around. That was a ton of fun, don't get me wrong, but I could have spent my time there in a much more productive way.

The trip I'll be on in about a month solves this problem. I'll have structured days planned for me, seeing the sights of Russia on tours instead of stumbling onto the important things. Of course, half the fun in traveling to other places is just walking around, stumbling upon this and that. But the value added to the travels by the tours (plus the cruise to St. Petersburg from Moscow) is huge. It's an opportunity I shouldn't pass up. I should also add that this is my dad's fault for alerting me to this trip way back last semester.

And now I must go play my final broomball game of my college career.

Greek Running

I found an article, via Marginal Revolution, on Greek bank runs. In the EMU, you can withdraw your money from your country's banks and deposit it in another EMU country and still do business. The article discusses deposit insurance as a way to curb banks runs. If citizens don't view the insurance as credible, though, the insurance will fail to prevent a bank run. One factor that determines credibility would be GDP. If the country's income isn't large enough to cover the amount of deposits along with it's other expenses, how will insurance work? Ohio had a deposit insurance scheme as recently as 1985, and it failed. And the best line in the article: "...in 1985 and even today, Ohio's GDP is larger than that of Greece."

Tax Day!

So, with only two and a half weeks until school ends - and another week until I graduate, tax day arrives. On this joyous day, folks from coast to coast are gathering to protest the grotesque size to which the US government has grown. There was TARP and the Stimulus, and now there's the new healthcare reform and talk of adding a VAT on top of the already existing taxes. Plenty to be mad about.

What I thought was interesting is that when I visited the Cincinnati Tea Party site, I noticed at the bottom they are also partnering with Our Community Bread, an organization in Over-the-Rhine aimed at helping the poor in the Cincinnati area. I just wanted to say: I like this. The Tea Party folks truly are focused on what is important: keeping the government (especially the federal government) small and out of the way, so the local community - not necessarily the government - can focus on the important local problems in their own way.

Long Day

It was, especially for starting at 10am. I got up, went to class, tried to finish my homework, etc. I talked with Dr. Brezhneva about traveling. The Economics Department Award Ceremony was today, too. I won the Dell Snider Award presented to the top student(s) showing an interest in international economics. Brittany Barrett won the award, as well, and we had a good time trying to hang it on the wall. By winning the Snider award, Brittany and I join the prestigious ranks of the likes of Chris Pirone - Nick Pirone's older brother. I went to dinner at Phan Shin's with my parents. And then I played hockey, from which I just got back. We won, for once, even though it was by default. The other team was playing people not on their roster and they were found out. Still, it's a win.

Also: I bought plane tickets for Russia.

RUSSIA BABY!!!!

Moscow to St. Petersburg. It WILL be awesome.

A Decision

I am going to Purdue.

I got into Virginia, which was the school to which I originally wanted to go when I started applying to places. Honestly, Purdue was just about the bottom of the list. OSU was the last school, and once I got into a school other than OSU, it was off the list. So once I got into Virginia, the schools I had to choose between were UVa and Purdue. Comparing the two by location, Virginia is the obvious winner. It's in Virginia and I like Virginia. Meanwhile, Purdue is in central Indiana a bit north of Indy. I know similar terrain quite well and am looking for something different. Of course, I put too much weight on location since in grad school I've heard there isn't much time to do anything other than study. So I discounted that by saying I can have fun anywhere, and if I can have fun in Oxford, then it's probably true. Based on academics, the US News and World Report rank Purdue at 42 and Virginia at 28. But there are other rankings. If you rank them by placements, one of the most important stats when looking at grad schools, Purdue and UVa come out about the same. Plus, a Purdue professor said that UVa doesn't do as much micro foundations of macro, which I think is pretty cool. He also wrote that UVa doesn't do as much finance/monetary research, which I like. Both departments look very well rounded, and Purdue has a decent experimental econ program. So academically, Purdue has a big enough edge on UVa to win this category. Another difference between the two is that I've heard Purdue has a more welcoming, friendlier, "collegial" atmosphere than UVa. Since Purdue professors are calling me and the Krannert School sent me more information about Purdue (even before I was accepted) than any other school, I can definitely see this. UVa is also slow in their admissions process, it seems. I got their acceptance letter well after I got everyone else's. To boot, a Purdue econ professor called me saying they were behind schedule on their funding decisions the night before I heard from UVa. He wanted to make sure I hadn't gotten any offers that would trump Purdue (read: MIT), so he wouldn't waste an funding offer on me. Purdue is giving me a "half-time" offer, which is $18,000 for the year and I have to work for a professor grading or doing data collection or whatever for about 20 hours a week. When Purdue has the academic edge, it'd be stupid to turn down that offer.

Purdue sent me a packet to review for next year. It's 155 pages long. Luckily, though luck has little to do with it, I've seen almost all of the material before. So the review should be pretty fun and easy.

I'm really looking forward to graduating from Miami and beginning my studies at Purdue. It'll be a relief to get out of Oxford for good.